Only a very small portion of the land in New Hampshire is suitable for agricultural use, but much of that farmland is very good, with soils that rank high in national, as well as state, indexes. Land that has been used for agriculture is also very easy to develop, both because of its innate qualities and because it is already cleared and leveled. Many traditional farmers are reaching retirement age and wondering who will carry on farming their land when they choose to retire. These three factors lead some land use and farming experts to consider land in active agriculture to be the most endangered land type in the state. Farmers and those who care about farm land conservation may find useful information in the following publications.

Preserving Rural Character: The Agricultural Connection

This publication is a technical bulletin from the New Hampshire Office of State Planning that explores the link between the often cited desire for New Hampshire communities to retain their “rural character” and the presence of working farms in the community: click here (182 KB PDF).

Conserving the Family Farm

This publication, written by an attorney with many years of experience conserving New Hampshire family farms, provides a thorough view of the issues that confront farm families when they consider the possible impacts of placing a conservation easement on their working farm land: click here (734 KB PDF).

Preserving Family Lands

These books, by a tax attorney and national expert on land conservation, provide a lot of detailed and easy to understand information about land ownership and tax and estate planning opportunities: click here.

Creating an Agricultural Commission

If you get really excited about agriculture in your community and want to start an Agriculture Commission to work toward preserving farms in your community, this publication will guide you through that process:
click here (7.0 MB PDF).